Born in Sài Gòn, Việt Nam in 1970, now living in the US as a claimed and renamed TRA

The Americans Are Coming!

In Asia, wherever the U.S. military went, prostitution and intermarriage came along for the ride. Official U.S. military policy discouraged its personnel from consorting and fraternizing with the native female population. But, the fact that thousands of mixed race children were born to Korean and Vietnamese women tells us that regardless of the rules, human nature took over.

When it came to prostitution, top U.S. brass looked the other way, while local pimps and madames carved out certain sections of the city for soldiers and civilian personnel to spend their R&R breaks. This was all done under the watchful gaze of local authorities, many of whom took a substantial cut in the proceeds.

And, what would a war be without the crime of rape that, for time immemorial, has been used to dominate the indigenous population and erase a proud people’s sense of self-worth.

The media portrayed the products of their loins, the Amerasians, as caged animals who were abandoned by their unfeeling mothers and missing-in-action fathers. Americans feared that these children would become innocent victims of cruel and inhumane treatment by Oriental savages. This racist fantasy took the focus off the fact that American and other Western men had violated or cavorted with Korean and Vietnamese women ostensibly to teach the enemy a lesson.

In order to soothe their conscience and fulfill a sense of obligation to those fathered by their countrymen, Americans advocated for the adoption of Amerasians. Since these children were assumed to be half American and they didn’t ask to be born, it was reasoned that they should share in the benefits and good fortune of being a U.S. citizen. Unintentional or not, the adopting out of Amerasian children became the Trojan Horse for institutionalizing international adoption across the board.

Paradoxically, American military intervention paved the way for private U.S. citizens to intervene in the affairs of Korean and Vietnamese families, thus establishing ever more control over these nations.